Anthology
by Stone Jackal
Summary: A collection of stories, mostly featuring Agents Ward and Simmons, but other characters will appear.
1. Concussion

_**Author's Notes: **To get back into the groove of writing again and to use the pieces I seem to keep amassing only in notebooks, I've started this. A collection of mostly one-shots featuring Ward and Simmons, but many other characters will appear._

_Please feel free to send prompts, and I'll try my best. :~)_

_On to the first, **Concussion.** Bonus points to anyone who recognizes where the list of presidents comes from..._

* * *

Their last mission had actually gone well. He'd add _for once_, but Skye had been adamant that saying it aloud would just jinx them for the next one. He had never put much stock in jinxes, but to avoid having to listen to her go on and on (and _on_), Ward had kept the _for once_ to himself. The only real hitch they'd had was when they were reloading the short bus (the name stuck, to Coulson's dismay) to head back to the bus. Fitz had tossed him one of the equipment cases to add to the stack and Ward had underestimated the weight of the thing, so it set him back a little. Which would have been fine, except for Skye's leg.

His trainee swore up and down that it was an accident, but that tiny smirk that showed though made him wary. Because of that supposedly innocent leg and Fitz's unexpected toss, Ward had tripped, fallen backward and had his head connect solidly with the inside of the wheel well.

Catching that case and the feeling of falling was all he remembered until he had woken up later on with his head in Simmons' lap (not a bad place to wake up at all), but apparently it had been quite the spectacle. Skye had started swearing on a loop (shit-shit-shit-_shit_) and Fitz had scrambled to get into the van, all the while apologizing in a steady stream of words. According to May, it had been Simmons who'd stepped in while the other two had floundered. She had ushered the other two back; sent Skye to get May and Coulson and instructed Fitz to find the first aid kit. By the time Ward came to, they were almost back to the bus (not that it was a long drive), and his head was still nestled in Simmons' lap.

In the end, his speech wasn't slurred, he wasn't nauseated, and his ears weren't ringing. But he'd been unconscious for more than a few minutes, couldn't walk in a straight line (the room was tilting), and he'd zoned out when Fitz was going though one of his scientific monologues. In Ward's defence, it was Fitz rambling quickly through long terms he didn't understand, and he was tired and already irritated. So it was decided that he had a concussion; the kind of concussion where it was deemed necessary for someone to wake him up every couple of hours. This was so, as Skye so eloquently put it, he didn't fall asleep and die.

Thankfully though, he was rescued from anymore of her attempts at humor or Fitz's rambling when calm, sweet Simmons offered to be the one responsible for waking him up. Ward had begrudgingly agreed to this, after Coulson had essentially ordered him to, and he'd recently discovered that waking up to Simmons hovering over him was much more pleasant than Fitz or Skye.

The first time she had shaken his shoulder, he felt as though he had only just fallen asleep.

"Sorry," She winced sympathetically when he stared up at her through hooded eyes, "How're you feeling?"

He yawned into the crook of his elbow and grumbled, "Tired."

"Sorry," Simmons said again, placing a hand on each of his cheeks.

"What are you doing?" Ward glanced from her wrists (tiny, fragile things) back up to her face to find her staring straight into his eyes.

"Making sure you haven't developed a fever," She replied absently, her gaze going from one of his eyes to the other, "And checking your pupils. I've found doing it this way is more pleasant than the alternative," He didn't even ask what the alternative might be, and after a moment she released his face, "Both appear to be normal."

Sinking back to the mattress as soon as she'd let him go, Ward mumbled sleepily, "Great."

"Op, no. Not so fast Agent Ward," She scolded lightly, "Just a quick memory review and then you can go right on back to dream land."

Sighing, he dragged himself back upright again, "Test?"

Simmons smiled, "Just to make sure there are no lapses in that poor, abused head of yours. Can you name the capitals of the last four countries we've been in for me?"

Ward rattled them off easily, yawning some in between, and Simmons smiled again. He found he rather liked the sight of it, even at half past midnight.

"Very good," She teased before prompting again, "Okay, if you can name the last five United States presidents for me, you win the prize."

"Is the prize sleep?"

She chuckled, "Another few precious hours."

So he listed, "Current one's Ellis, before that was Henry Hayes. Before that was Clinton, Nixon and Truman."

"Congratulations Ward," Simmons patted his shoulder as she stood from where she'd sat on the edge of his bed, "You've earned yourself a nap."

"Yay," He mumbled as he dropped back to the mattress, "Night Doc."

"See you in a couple of hours," She turned off the desk lamp before leaving his bunk.

She returned, as promised, at around two-thirty. They ran through the same routine again, different questions, but the same basic idea. But as she went to leave (and later he would _so_ blame it on the head wound), Ward quipped,

"What – not even gonna tuck me in?"

"What was I thinking?" There was a bemused expression on her face as Simmons returned to the edge of his bed. She bent over him, that soft smile warming her eyes as she looked down at him, tugging the blanket up over his shoulders. Ward was quiet, silently (and he would never admit it) enjoying the feeling of being taken care of for once. Simmons reached up just a little, her hand cool as she brushed her fingers through his hairline gently, "Better now?"

Drifting back to sleep already, he simply murmured, "Hmmm."

"Enjoy your nap," Simmons chuckled as she reached for the light again and slipped from the room.


	2. Crimson

**Author's Notes: **_Many thanks to everyone who read, reviewed or favorited! Special mention goes out to __**Princess PrettyPants **__who guessed that Ellis was the President in __**Iron Man 3.**__ No guess on Henry Hayes though :~)_

_This one goes out to __**See Me As I Am 101**__ for their prompt about Ward getting hurt protecting Simmons. I hope you enjoy **Crimson**._

* * *

The whole thing went sideways in a right hurry.

One minute, she had been having a genial conversation with a few of the locals. It was quiet, fairly normal. They were even stateside.

But in the next second, it became chaos with screams, squealing tires and the roar of gunfire. Someone, a male voice, hollered her name just before what felt like a brick wall tackled her to the ground and pinned her there.

"I got you," That voice; rough, male and _familiar_, came again, this time breathless and right in her ear, "You okay?"

"W—Ward?" She managed to stutter, curling beneath him, sticking her arms back behind her and over his shoulders to cover both of their heads, "What—what's happening?"

"Ambush," Ward's voice croaked, huddling them both closer to the ground.

The gunfire seemed to drone on and on forever, and at the same time be over all at once. Voices started calling out – voices she recognized – people trying to gauge the extent of the damage. Simmons shuffled under Ward, but he didn't move. Instead, the specialist released a pained groan.

"Ward?" Simmons yelped, that split second of relief gone as the vise was back around the pit of her stomach, "Ward, are you hurt?"

He didn't answer, instead dragged himself off of her with what sounded like a great, terribly painful effort, only to collapse on the ground beside her. Simmons sprang up and turned to crouch over Ward, to find her teammate gasping with his torso soaked in blood.

"Ward!" Fighting back a cloying panic, Simmons instinctively pressed both hands over the still spurting hole just below his ribs. He grunted at the contact, the sound deepening as she applied pressure to the wound, and though she watched his face – heavy lidded and pinched—she cried out for the others, "Help! Ward's hit!"

Ward gasped out a heaving breath, clenching his entire face to ask, "You," He had to pause to catch his breath, "You okay?"

As he panted the last syllable, that vise inside her squeezed tighter and she sobbed, "I'm okay," His head dipped in what must have been supposed to be a nod and his eyes slid shut, and Simmons screamed, "Help!"

The medics had to peel her away from Ward so they could work on him, and once they had him on the stretcher, they left her rooted to that spot on the ground, staring at the pool of that awful red. The noise around her fell away, as if it was at one end of a tunnel and she at the other. All she could do was stare at the horrible puddle. That liquid that should be keeping Ward alive, leaked out onto the mud.

Two hands landed on her shoulders, shocking her out of her stupor, "Simmons?" Skye shook her to get her attention, until the hacker spotted both the blood on the ground and the blood all over Simmons, "Jemma!?"

Simmons yanked herself out of Skye's grasp, curling her arms protectively around herself, "It's not mine. It's Ward's."

* * *

Ward was immediately whisked into surgery, and the team gathered in the waiting room. They looked up hopefully at each person in scrubs that went by, until Skye lost the little bit of patience she possessed, and demanded answers from a passing nurse. Fitz managed to pull her back, dodging swinging elbows and trying to quiet her obscene litany of curses before he could get her to take a seat again.

Simmons sat on a chair a few paces away from the rest of them, plucking at the stray thread in the hem of the scrub top one of the hospital personnel had given her to wear. May had taken one look at her when they'd arrived and gently instructed that the biochemist might want to clean up. Once alone in the bathroom, Simmons had looked at herself in the mirror, red streaked everywhere, and nearly began to hyperventilate. Staring at her hands in the sink, even with the water rushing over them, she could still feel Ward's blood pouring through her fingers, hear every shuddering breath he took and before she knew it, Simmons had used the entire dispenser full of liquid soap to scrub her hands raw. May had caught her at that too, but the pilot hadn't said a word. She had simply laid the bundle of clothing on the counter, turned off the facet and wrapped rolls of paper towel around Simmons' hands, patting them dry.

They sat, waiting, for a long time. An agent arrived at one point, motioning to Coulson. The two of them stepped away from the team, talking quietly. That agent left moments later and Coulson returned to the team. He told them that it was a drive-by, some kind of local beef that had brought the guys with guns to the party. It was so inanely, so disgustingly _pedestrian_ to everything else they'd faced that she can barely wrap her mind around it. Of all the things that could have taken them down, of all the things that have already tried, it was a gang-banger in a rundown, pea-green GTO that does it.

Hours go by before a doctor finally came looking for them. His mask hung from two strings around his neck, and he held his skull cap in one hand. He found himself met with a line of grim faces as he asked, "Grant Ward?"

They all looked up, and Coulson stood as he answered, "He's ours."

The doctor, a soft spoken, middle aged fellow who introduced himself as Dr. Downey, explained that Ward had been exceptionally lucky, the bullet tearing through his diaphragm and missing his internal organs. All it would have taken was a few centimeters in either direction, and they would be having an entirely different conversation in that hallway. Dr. Downey gave them a kind smile as Fitz and Skye clamored to be able to see Ward, saying that he had lost a lot of blood, he needed his rest. Coulson spoke up, bargaining to get at least a glimpse of their specialist. Dr. Downey eventually relented, holding up an index finger,

"One person in the room. The rest will have to settle for seeing him through the window just now," Both Fitz and Skye began to argue, but the doctor interrupted them, "Your friend needs his rest. One person for now."

The doctor stepped away to give them a moment to discuss it between themselves, and it ended up that May was the one to make the call.

"Simmons goes," She instructed in her quiet way and Coulson agreed quickly. For once, both Fitz and Skye were quiet.

* * *

Dr. Downey led her to Ward's room, but left her to enter in her own time. Eventually she made her way into the room, even more time passing before she grabbed the lonely chair from across the room and wheeled it up to his bedside.

"Hi," Her voice broke over the nearly silent room, her first word in hours, and she laid a hand on top of his wrist, staying on the side of him that wasn't strung with wires and tubes and the like. He wore an oxygen mask over his mouth and nose, but that was much preferred over his being intubated. His breath sounds were great strides better than the wheezing noises he'd been making back in the mud. Looking at the monitors, Simmons could tell that his stats were improving; slowly but improving.

Still carefully holding onto his hand, she lowered herself to sit in the chair, forcing herself to breathe normally. Ward looked so different, so helpless and pale and so far away from his norm that it frightened her to see him like that. Slowly, Simmons slid her hand down and entwined her fingers between his, growing a watery smile as she inspected the difference in size and texture from his hand to hers. She sat there for a long time, not saying a word, just listening to him breathe. Letting the steady rhythm of his inhale then exhale and the continuous drone of the monitors lull her back to some form of equilibrium.

She never could stomach that shade of red again.


End file.
